Mel C spoke about dealing with mental health issues and eating disorders

Mel C spoke about dealing with mental health issues and eating disorders

As part of one of the most popular girl groups of all time, Mel C (aka Melanie Chisholm) – you probably know her as Sporty Spice – quickly became a recognizable name for the legions of Spice Girls fans around the world in the late '90s. But today, Chisholm gets candid about some of the personal struggles she's dealt with during the group's stratospheric rise to fame. According to a new interview with the Daily Mail, she struggled with mental health issues and eating disorders while she and her bandmates topped the charts and traveled the world.

Ahead of the release of her memoir The Sporty One: My Life as a Spice Girl, the 48-year-old spoke to the publication about her time as a Spice Girl. The pressure of fame led Chisholm to exercise too much and develop disordered eating habits, along with serious mental health issues at the time, she revealed.

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In her memoir, Chisholm recounts how she was body-shamed in 1994 by the group's first manager, who saw her doing a backflip and said, "I'm surprised you can do backflips with thighs like that," according to the Daily Mail. At the time, the same manager asked her bandmate Victoria Beckham (aka Posh Spice) to "lose a few pounds."

Then, of course, came global superstardom in 1996, as the group worked seemingly non-stop until their first break in late 2000. “I was pretty bad for a few years,” Chisholm said in the recent interview. "Physically, when I look back, I don't know how I did it; considering how little I lived and how much exercise I did on top of a brutal schedule."

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For a few years the star survived mainly on fruit and vegetables, she revealed, now admitting that this was not a "sustainable lifestyle". Her body has experienced the effects of her diet, she added. "I was never so anorexic that I had to be hospitalized, thank God. But my period stopped, so my body fat was obviously too low," she explained in the interview. ICYDK, sudden weight loss and too much exercise can cause you to miss your period, according to the National Health Service.

Then she started binge eating, which is not uncommon for people with anorexia. A 2021 review of 12 studies published in Springer Nature found that about 42 percent of people with anorexia develop binge eating disorder (BED), and both disorders are often comorbid (i.e., they co-occur) with other mental health problems such as depression, anxiety, and agoraphobia (a fear of or avoidance of environments that may not feel safe) — all of which Chisholm was struggling with at the time, she recently shared.

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When the Spice Girls first broke up in December 2000, "the wheels fell off" due to the group's "level of fame," Chisholm explained. "So many of my problems were caused by control or lack of control. I was binge drinking. I was binge eating. I was embarrassed and ashamed of it. I had to keep it a secret because even though you deny it, there's still that tiny little voice: 'This isn't right, you can't keep doing this.'"

Chisholm eventually sought help from a doctor, who prescribed her antidepressants, but she and her bandmates had "little support" for their mental health, she told the Daily Mail. “It wasn’t even considered at the time.”

Although she still has fond memories of her Sporty Spice days, Chisholm seems to recognize the importance of sharing the dark side of her experience with fame. "I never want to look back on this time negatively, but it's important to me to tell the difficult parts of my past. Our culture has changed so much and so many young people are hungry for fame. And I just want them to be prepared. It's not easy sailing.

Thankfully, she seems to be in a much better place now - kudos to her for her honesty and openness about what she was going through behind the scenes back then. Her story is sure to help both longtime fans who grew up with the Spice Girls and newcomers dreaming of their own big break.

If you or someone you know is suffering from an eating disorder, please contact the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) at 1-800-931-2237 or visit NationalEatingDisorders.org.